Effective presentations
time to complete: 20-25 minutes
So, let’s start with thinking about what makes a presentation effective. We are sure you have plenty of ideas based on your previous experience of attending or delivering presentations. There’s definitely a lot that can be said about presentations; if you were to search for ‘effective presentations’ in Google, you would get 215,000,000 results!!!
Here, we will briefly introduce some factors that we think are very important and therefore worth remembering, regardless of your context and type of presentation you need to deliver.
| Factor | Example |
Careful planning and preparation | searching for articles and other resources |
| Good time management | checking your progress regularly |
| Relevant and interesting content | deciding what to include and what to leave out |
| Clear structure | providing an outline of your presentation |
| Good communication skills | speaking clearly |
| Appropriate use of technologies | being familiar with the equipment and/or software |
| Clear supporting documentation | providing a note-taking handout |
| Suitable audience participation | explaining when you will take questions |
Listed adapted from Chivers & Shoolbred (2007, p.20)
This list is not intended to be exhaustive; it is merely some examples of what you can do. Let’s have a look at some more examples by doing a task.
Task: Match the examples to the features of a good presentation.
Now, we are moving on to communication skills. Let’s have a look at three different types of communication and learn why they are important for presentations.
By verbal communication skills we mean how you use your voice to communicate your message to the audience. There are many factors that affect the effectiveness of your verbal communication. Here are some important ones:
- pronunciation of individual sounds
- word stress
- sentence stress
- intonation
- connected speech
- chunking
- pauses
- volume
- pace
By non-verbal communication we mean communication that does not involve words or speech. This includes things such as your gestures, posture, facial expressions, eye contact and other body language. Non-verbal communication is equally important as it can affect how the audience experiences your presentation. Imagine, for example, the impact you would have on the audience if you rolled your eyes after a question you didn’t want to be asked. Or perhaps, if you were presenting by reading out loud from a piece of paper without making any eye contact with the audience. Both of these would have a negative impact on your performance during the presentation.
Finally, it is worth considering the impact that your visuals have on communication. Visual communication refers to choosing the right visual to communicate your ideas. Obviously, stylistic choices can be a personal matter, but it is very important to consider things like the font type, colour and size as well as the background since these affect accessibility and readability, therefore impacting the audience’s ability to follow your presentation.
To find out more about pronunciation and work on your pronunciation skills such as word stress, intonation, chunking, etc., visit our self-access pronunciation guide (link below)
Task: Reflect on your personal experience as presenter and/or member of an audience. What other factors can affect visual communication? Note down some ideas, then check with our suggested answers below.
Here are some things that can have a negative impact on visual communication:
- Too much text
- Too many bullet points
- Too many different font colours and types
- Distracting colours or colour combinations
- Too many animations/transitions
- Poor quality images e.g. too small or pixelated
- Images that are irrelevant to the content or might be considered unprofessional
- Visuals that don’t match the nature of your data
- Spelling or grammar mistakes
- Missing information/slides
- Slides in the wrong order
Final word
As you can see, an effective presentation is not just a matter of how fancy your slides are or how confident you are with speaking in public. Presenting effectively involves careful planning and preparation in terms of content, organisation, language, technology and, of course, with your audience in mind. The decisions you will make are determined by your own context. Just imagine the following three scenarios and consider the choices you would make when preparing for your presentation.
Scenario 1
- Assessed presentation (Weight: 30%)
- Brief offers 5 topics to choose from
- Slides required – 10 minutes
- Pre-recorded & submitted via Blackboard
- 5 minute Q&A with tutor on Google Meet
- Written feedback from tutor – marking criteria sheet
Scenario 2
- Presenting at a conference
- Your research project
- Slides required – 20 minutes
- Face-to-face (number of attendees= not known)
- Room includes desktop, interactive whiteboard and projector
- Q&A 10 minutes
Scenario 3
- Informal presentation
- Present your idea for your research proposal to your classmates
- No slides – 3 minutes
- Online ‘live’ (small groups – Blackboard Collaborate)
- Q&A and peer feedback